The dating game

Over a rather delicious plate of foie gras creme brulee with friends the other night at La Marmite, the conversation turned to dating in New York.

Now, anyone who lives or has lived in New York will know that being single and female there is hell. To say competition is rife would be an understatement and, what's worse, is that the prize isn't even that exciting. I haven't done the research, but go to any party and you will see a sea of beautifully dressed women, all looking hopefully across at you as you enter the front door, glazing past you and focusing on your right shoulder in hopes that you might be coming with a man... and that maybe that man might be single.

Upon moving to New York solo, finding a man quickly becomes a full time job - just secondary to building your high powered career which keeps you intellectually superior, more affluent than you were wherever you came from and, inevitably, much more intimidating to a man than you've ever been before. And the fact that there are thousands of women just like you (maybe a little taller, shorter, rounder, thinner) doesn't help matters much either.

In comes the dating game. A game of hide and seek which becomes the only way to stay ahead of the game, keep men calling, keep you on dates and prevent you from getting your heart broken. No, I never said this would help anyone find love, it just helps you keep your head above water, because it inevitably results in your heart freezing over a little (T had to conduct some serious de-frosting - which I'll leave for another day).

So, here are some thoughts on how I think the game works, and how to play it:

How things go when the girl doesn't play the game:

1*. Boy meets girl at party/bar/club. They get on well blah blah

2. They kiss goodnight and end up going to his apartment

3. Girl says goodbye to boy in the morning as she's already made brunch plans to gossip about exactly that night with her friends. Boy says he's so happy to meet her and promises to call

4. Girl goes to brunch

5. Girl waits for boy to call. Boy doesn't call. Ever.

How things go when the girl plays the game:

1*. Boy meets girl at party/bar/club. They get on well blah blah

2. Girl leaves the party earlier as she has another party to go to. Sorry, mate, bye! Boy sniffs a chase and asks her for her number

3. Three days later (two is ok, one hits the ego - if they met on a Friday, he won't text until Wednesday), boy texts girl (no call) to ask her out for dinner in three days time (same as above re ego and risk management)

4. Girl replies 6 hours after receiving text (she's busy, thank you) that yes, she can meet

5. Girl text boy on the day of the date that she will be a little late

6. Girl arrives 10 minutes late. Dinner proceeds. Girl is warm, friendly etc but distant

7. Girl says she's going home after dinner. Boy walks girl home. Girl makes it quite clear she won't be up for any kissing

8. Boy texts that night that "it was a wonderful evening". Girl replies she enjoyed it to (throw a bone).

9. Next day (or two), boy texts again to meet again later that week. Girl agrees.

10. Repeat points 7-9 ad infinitum, adding day dates, afternoon walks and candle-lit dinners where appropriate

*Same applies to online dating

Just a little prick

Picture from Elle France on the wonders of surgery

Like any product life cycle, mainstream beauty care is in the process of taking one large step to the right.

Face cleansers, scrubs and creams, once for-girls-only, have been asked to step aside for the much sexier, cooler, more effective men's 'grooming' products. Much like cars, men need to be "turboed", "boosted" and "pummeled." Of course, this isn't new news. Seeing male models with their shirts open to reveal glistening six packs while handing out "ab sculpting" cream round the streets of Hong Kong on a Saturday night is no longer a surprise, and nor is the fact that all the Clarins for Men creams "ejaculate" rather than pour. But what has resulted from this obvious shift to the right, with women's products stepping out of the limelight and men's products stepping in, is a new participant to the left - surgery.

Once reserved for the rich and famous (and mad), surgery is now the new fountain of youth for women. Away with your oxygenating face cream! Flush your placenta masks down the toilet! We now have botox, eye lifting, face peeling, collagen implants all for under 100 GBP a pop! Magazines' beauty pages are now full of enthusiastic testimonials and undercover journalist's recounts of how yoga once a week and little prick of a needle here and there once a month has changed lives.

So, where does that leave the rest of us? Those of us 'old fashioned' types who would rather not schedule an eye lift with our pedicures. Next to the hopes and dreams of botox, Estee Lauder's Hydrationist Revival Plant Extract cream's promise to "leave skin youthful and healthier" seems rather feeble.

As I roam the aisles of Watson's pharmacy and Harvey Nichols' beauty floor in search of something that can meet the new competition, I find myself staring longingly at the men's aisle. Their creams aren't being overshadowed by a greater enemy, there's still hope with them. T's Men Expert Pure & Matt Bright Charcoal Black Coal suddenly has a whole new appeal.

Chewing

I read in a (bridal) magazine that you could lose 6lb in 6 days by going to the Viva Mayr Clinic to learn to chew slowly. You would be taught the "philosophy of chewing" and spend a week turning your food into pulp in your mouth before swallowing. All for a mere 2500GBP.

Honestly, what other money-sucking ploy are they going to invent? Squeezing your bum every time you take a mouthful (with a bum squeezing session and philosophy course included)?

That said, this chewing thing has been on my mind. So, yesterday, as I sat next to two slim Chinese ladies on the plane, I decided I would eat at their pace and see if their skinniness had anything to do with chewing -as opposed to their genes, which I can obviously do nothing about.

So I watched them out of the corner of my eye, and only took a mouthful when they did... It's never taken me so long to eat a -sorry, half- a tiny plastic bowl of noodles in my life.

They took the smallest bites on earth, and sometimes to my deepest annoyance, they would start to chew a bit of noodle off their fork, and then put it down with the noodles still on it, and take a sip of tea. Then came the fruit. Instead of wolfing it down and letting the juices drip down their chins, they carefully and slowly opened the little saucer, sniffed the fruit, prodded it, put it down and then had about a third of a slice of watermelon. At which point they must have been full or bored, as they put the fruit aside, sipped their tea, leant back and proceeded to sleep/touch up her makeup.

That's 6lb in 6 minutes, baby!

Please send 2500GBP directly to my Swiss bank account.

South Africa Part III

Sorry it's taken me so long to post the final post of this South African trilogy. I got eaten by wedding dresses and flower arrangements.

So, where were we? Ah yes, leaving Cape Town and heading for Stellenbosch. As we left Table Mountain behind us, the scenery quickly changed from the dry, yellow bush of the Cape Flats, and its now much-visited-by-idiotic-tourists townships, to estate after estate of vineyards, with the backdrop of breathtaking mountains behind them.

We went to Vergelegen for a slap up lunch with much wine. After which we recovered in the shade of the camphor trees.

We then headed over to our guesthouse - the nicest place I could find that didn't cost 600USD a night - no, that's not an extra 0. It's called Lovane, and it's on a lovely wine estate, which was started up a few years ago by a mechanic. Odd. Anyway we thoroughly enjoyed it.

In addition to drinking and eating like thirsty game by a watering hole, T decided that we needed to do some exercise. My fave. So we went running up through the vineyards which caused me to almost died of exhaustion and T managed to get a hole in his head with a branch. Not one of our most successful excursions.

View from our room. Add this pic to the top pic, and you get the full picture

One of many vineyards

Navigating the SA section of the wine list just got that much easier and tastier.

We'll be back!

Info for foodies: if you're going to Terroir or anywhere pretentious, book well in advance. Give the Big Easy a miss, unless you want to eat Texan food in South Africa. In Franschoek, go to Ryan's Kitchen for a minimalist lunch with South African food gone foamy.

South Africa Part II

After Kruger, we headed down to Cape Town. It was at this point in the holiday that T decided to break the news that yours truly would be the designated driver-as-some-of-us-had-lost-their-driver's-license-in-Paris-or-somewhere.

Now, those who know me from Barcelona, will remember that my driving was shaky at best. Well, that was the last time I drove. So...seven years ago, not including the odd stint on the open highways of the US with nothing to get in my way other than Bogangles and Dunkin' Donuts. So, you can just imagine how excited I was to get behind that wheel again and drive...on the wrong side of the road and in a country where J walking seems to be a much favored pass time.

Anyway, we survived my driving and I got to show T the sights and the sights (aka gran, aunts, uncles, god parents) all got to see T.

One of many views from table mountain, which you get to enjoy after being whisked up on the cable car at break-neck speed

View from Chapman's peak. A much needed stop for our driver who can't-drive-and-look-out-the-window

Mile upon mile of beaches

Cape Point - the end of the world, where dragons feature on maps

In case you didn't believe me..

On our way back from the end of the world, we passed Simon's Town and its resident penguins

After having successfully gone up the mountain and driven round the Cape peninsula, we decided to take T windsurfing in Langebaan, followed by a stroll on Clifton beach.

T adding another country to his list of windsurfing spots (while I read Hello, Heat, Now, Cosmo Brides and Vogue)

Romantic walk along Clifton

The next day was spent at the Garden Centre with Gran, her local haunt, where she knows everyone by name and says jokes like, "you though I'd died!" when people mention they haven't seen her in while.

She's also quite friendly with the pharmacist who she had a lengthy conversation with, calling her Rose throughout. As we left, she held my arm and said "Her real name's Mary, but I prefer Rose. She doesn't mind."

We also skipped over to Kirstenbosch botanical gardens where we didn't take any pics for some strange reason.

All in all in the Cape, much time was spent with friends and family, where T was aired, we caught everyone up on weddings and Hong Kong, people exclaimed I looked thin (yay), and much alcohol was consumed by all - except the driver - no comment.

Sunset view from Bantry Bay

More to come on South Africa soon, once T has sent me his pics.

Tips on Cape Town:

Eat: Twelve Apostles for crocodile carpaccio and breathtaking views, River Cafe for wine country delicacies, Friday Island for fab views and crap food for windsurfers in Langebaan

Drink: La Med for drinks over the beach, Camps Bay for South Beach Miami vibe

Tea and Coffee with Gran: Cassis for French pastries and coffee, Mount Nelson for slap up high tea

South Africa Part I

After all the snow in Japan, we thought now would be a good time to go to South Africa. Warm up, spot some game and feed T to the lions, I mean, my relatives.

Our trip started in Kruger Park, which had had unprecedented rainfall, and so there was much looking-through-the-tall-grass-and-hoping-to-see-an-animal.

We hired a guide, who provided us with interesting morsels of information - did you know elephants talk to each other in a secret low frequency language through their diaphragms?, served rusks and tea for breakfast and slap up braais for dinner, and suggested that taking pictures of each other next to lions would most definitely result in death.

Chinese tourists have been known to try it. Rather unsuccessfully.

Camouflage

Prey watching the sunrise

Thai massage

More camouflage

Anyway, you get the idea. Lots of bush and wild animals. Not too many herds though. Must have coincided with a conference or something, as watering holes were empty and leopards and cheetahs were not to be found.

p.s.

For those of you thinking of going to Kruger:

August and September are when there are no animal conferences, so you'll see the most animals

Wild Wings Safaris are reasonably priced, give good tours and feed you well (we did the 3 day quickie safari)

Don't pee in the bushes. You won't live to tell the story.

Tokyo

The Emperor's back yard

Like most of us, I presume, one tends to have some idea of what Tokyo is like before one arrives. Whether these notions are true or not really depends on the amount of research one has done beforehand or whether one is basing one's ideas entirely on hearsay, on people they met at school when they were 13, Manga movies about football on Spanish TV and rumors about vending machines with dirty underwear in them. I fall into the last category.

I spent years with Japanese schoolmates who had CD players before we had Walkmen (remember the Walkman?), who ate seaweed while we were eating pretzels and who beat everyone at maths with their brains shut. Needless to say, I arrived in Tokyo with bated breath.

Yet, rather than arriving into "back the future", I felt like I was arriving home. The cobbled streets, the clear blue skies and the tiny little hole-in-the-wall restaurants and shops all felt distinctly European, and rather un-Asian.

Somewhere in Tokyo with large screens and a square. Rabbit-head is yours truly.

The modern architecture interspersed with old fashioned buildings were, well, a little Catalan?

Street in Ginza next to Joel Rubichon, where one can eat the most expensive savory crepe on earth ever.

That said, there is a whole other side of Tokyo which is the farthest thing from Europe that you could ever imagine. Blonde wigs, fake eyelashes, the shortest skirts on earth, love hotels (yes, by the hour, yes in the busiest of high streets), S&M outfits and glam boy bands that would make Jem wince.

Oh.. sorry.

Of course, the food was to die for, and I almost skidded off the treadill today trying to work off the 6 meals a day I enjoyed there.

But, why would you have waiters take your orders when you can use a slot machine?

Santa's workshop disguised as a French bakery

We will be back! And the warm toilet seats will not be forgotten.